Pulse
by XinTheErudite
Summary: He's alive. He's healing. I can hardly process what's happening to us. How do you even get a second chance like this? CAUTION: SPOILERS. Series of vignettes ( aka one-shots)
1. Chapter 1

The medical quarters are dim, and the fluorescent lights give off a sickly glow. The bad light turns R's skin gray again, and I want to rip off one of his bandages to make sure that his blood is still red-vital and living. I settle for watching the soft rise and fall of his chest as he breathes. I can just barely discern the flutter of his pulse in his neck.

A pulse.

I'm still in a state of shock. Everything has been upended and turned inside out. I'm sure the horrific truth of what happened to my father will sink in, eventually. At some strange and inopportune moment, I know I'll suddenly collapse into grief. Right now, though, all I feel is a kind of stupefied wonder at the life thrumming through R's veins. And hope-stronger than it's ever been before.

R stirs a little, dreaming. A frown furrows his forehead. I lean forward, fascinated with the fleeting changes of expression in his face. I remember the first time I saw the corners of his mouth twitch upward in the facsimile of a smile, how strange and jarring it was.

The dream he's having wakes him. Long lashes flick up from brilliant gold eyes. He glances around the dingy room until his gaze finds me. His expression relaxes and he smiles.

"Julie."

My name comes easily now, smoothly, no longer sounding ripped by sheer force from his vocal chords. He tries to sit up, and grimaces in pain.

"Stop." I tell him. "You'll open your wounds again."

"It hurts." He sounds delighted.

"Duh," I reply.

"You don't understand. It _hurts_." Laughter dances under his words.

I know what he means. He hurts because he's alive. I lean forward and press my lips against his. He responds, kissing me back and winding his uninjured hand through my hair. We pull apart a little and he rests his forehead against mine. "So much I want to say" he murmurs. "I always had so much happening in my head-so many things I wanted to tell someone. To tell you." His body shudders. I can't even begin to imagine what being dead was like for him.

"Do you remember anything from before?" I ask.

R leans back, eyes faraway. "Some." He replies. "I dream, but it's blurred. Like an old VHS tape. The vivid dreams are about here. Now." His eyes meet mine warmly. "You." I feel my face flush, surprising me. I'm no stranger to men's admiration. But somehow, R is making me blush. We both jump when the door rattles open. Nora sticks her head in.

"Hey guys." She grins widely at us. "I've got a visitor for R." She walks in, and an enormous man follows. It's R's friend, M. His skin hasn't quite lost all of its gray zombie flush, but he looks far more human than the last time I'd seen him.

"Dude, look at you!" He ruffles R's hair so hard it stands on end. "Looking all human and stuff."

R's eyes turn serious. "I always was human, M, _we_ always were. It's just-different states of being. Varying degrees of death"

M lets out a thunderous laugh. " Shit. I always knew you were some kind of philosophic genius under all that hair." He ruffles it again, so it stands up in the other direction. "My name's Marcus, by the way."

"Marcus." R's eyes stare past us. I wonder what they're looking at.

"Yeah. Do you remember your name?" R doesn't answer him for a moment. Then he just smiles.

"Just call me R." His hand finds mine, and we wrap our fingers together. I feel his heartbeat in his wrist. "Just R."


	2. Chapter 2

R had gone missing. When I go to see him in the morning, his bed in the medical quarters is empty, the blankets abandoned in a swirl at the foot. My first reaction is a nameless rush of fear and a rising heartbeat. I leave the room, questioning the nurse with no result. My feet quicken, and by the time I hit the narrow street outside I am running. A couple passersby remember a tall young man with dark hair go by. I'm not quite sure why I feel so scared. It's irrational, but I feel like if I let him out of my sight, he might disappear, shrivel back into the husk he'd been when we'd met.

The roof. I switch course, reaching the ladder that leads to the stadium roof. I pull myself up the last rung, and feel my entire body relax. There he is, arms around his knees, face tilted back towards the sun. I clatter over the edge of the ladder, my body shaky with relief. I sit next to him, leaning into him and letting my head fall onto his shoulder. He smells like fresh air and sunlight, and warmth radiates from him.

"Hey," I feel him turn to look at me. "What's wrong?'

I don't answer. It was childish, really, to panic like this. He leans his head on top of mine.

"What are you doing up here?" I ask. "You're going to reopen your wounds."

"Just sitting." He kisses my hair.

"Thinking?"

"Not really." A chill goes through me. R must feel me shiver. "I've been doing nothing but thinking for so long. " he explains. "It's beyond wonderful just to sit and _feel_."

This made sense. "Feeling, huh?" I feel a smile creep onto my face. I sit up, and swivel so I am practically sitting in his lap. Our faces are close, and I am gratified by the sight of a red flush staining his cheeks. I cup his face in my hands. His eyes are so serious as he looks at me. It almost scares me. I felt like I don't deserve to be looked at like that. To cover the embarrassment I suddenly feel, I kiss him, fiercely. His arms go around me, pulling me closer. His lips move to my jaw, my neck. After a while, we just sit, wound around each other, feeling the sun beat down on us.

I know what he's going to say almost before he says it. "Julie? I love you."

"Yeah?" I smile but didn't continue. He goes still, waiting, nervous. I lean back to look at him. As soon as he sees my expression, he smiles too, knowingly. There is nothing else that needs to be said.


	3. Chapter 3

"I need to go back to the airport."

I feel a leftover bit of fear uncurl in my stomach at R's words. I quell the feeling however, and manage a bright smile.

"To get some of your things?' I ask, thinking of the Frank Sinatra record R was so enamored of when we were holed up in the derelict plane. R smiles.

"My kids." He says. I am suddenly flooded by the same hollow feeling you get when you misstep on a slight of stairs.

"Your kids." I say. How could I have forgotten?

"Not MY kids," he replies. "When we were still dead, we often tried to form family units. Just instinct, I think. The Boneys were the most adamant about it. There was this girl I tried to have a relationship with. We didn't know what to do, we just had these vague instincts about relationships. The Boneys brought us the kids. Wanted us to be a family. Wanted us to stop hoping for something more and embrace our fate, I suppose."

This was a terribly long speech for R. He still was a man of long silences and few words, who spoke more carefully and thoughtfully than anyone I knew. I realize it was very important to him that I understand about his children. _Suppose_, I think. Most guys would just have said "guess." I wonder about R and his manner of speaking sometimes. He must have been highly educated once. A lot of information just seems to come to him, and I wondered if it's an echo of who he used to be.

R is looking at me expectantly, and I realize he has just asked me something while my mind had been wandering.

"Sorry?" I ask.

"I asked you if you minded." He replies. "About the kids. I just want to get them out of there, see if they're healing."

"Of course I don't mind." I tell him, and to my slight surprise, I do feel okay. I don't like the idea of having children myself, but these kids already exist. Already need someone to take care of them. Need us. "Kids." I say, half to myself. I feel my cheeks flush. R and I have never discussed what we are to each other, exactly. We just know without talking about it that we are together. I glance up. R is watching me, the expression in his brilliant golden eyes soft. "What?" I ask him. In lieu of an immediate answer, he leans forward and kisses me. He pulls back and leans his forehead against mine.

"Julie." There is a teasing undertone to his words. "I'm afraid I come with a ridiculous amount of baggage. Still-could you consider a future with someone like me?"

Emotion floods my chest, warm as sunlight. In a mock-serious tone I ask, "Are you asking me to be the mother of your children?" R pulls back, and brushes the back of his fingers along my cheek.

"You incandescent thing." I redden at his words.

"You're ridiculous. A ridiculous cheeseball." I say this, but throw my arms around his neck and squeeze him until he practically falls over, laughing.


	4. Chapter 4

The airport is as dank as I remember. The dust hangs in the air and coats the back of your throat. The smell of decay is so thick I feel half-surprised that I can't see it in the air, like a haze. It's early. The morning light is pale and anemic. The only things that are holding my twitching nerves in check are R's presence beside me-and the shotgun I'm carrying in the crook of my arm.

Some things are different, though. The few dead we meet don't snarl and fall upon us. They seem dazed, dreamy. They stare as R and I walk by, but they don't approach. We come across a pair of Boneys rounding a corner by the baggage claim. I cock my shotgun and the sudden percussive sound sends them away from us, hissing. I note that my hands are shaking as I lower the weapon. R lays his hand reassuringly on the small of my back.

"We're okay." He murmurs.

"Don't relax too much" I reply. "You're not an unstoppable zombie anymore. You'll die and bleed just like me. " _Or die and become undead once again_ I think, but I don't say this aloud. My hands tighten on the shotgun. _I am going to blow their rotting heads off first. Let them try and get their hands on him._

"You have murder in your eyes." R is laughing at me, softly. "I've never felt more safe."

I grumble at him, but as always, he makes me feel better. Hopeful. Even in this place. We continue on, deeper into the building. Down another dark hallway, and then suddenly we enter a terminal where the walls are all glass. Light floods in. I see movement, and raise the gun, but R is already stepping away from me, moving forward. I see them then, a boy and a girl, holding hands, standing in a pool of sun, staring out of the window. R stops a safe distance from them, and crouches down so he is the same height as the children. "Hey." he says softly, and they turn towards him. I walk up behind R, and when I am closer I get a good look at them. I remember them from before-and they are different. Their skin still looks dry, like paper, but the color is beginning to leach back into their faces. Pink, and soft eyes are wide, and a little frightened. R reaches out, and my heart rate speeds up. The children continue to stare at him, but then the little girl slowly reaches out and puts her wizened little hand into R's. "There we go." His voice is infinitely gentle. He rises, and turns to go back out. The children come along, staring up at the both of us. I feel a tug on my sleeve and nearly jump out of my skin. It's the boy. One of his hands still clasps the girl's tightly, and the other he extends to me. It suddenly feels hard to swallow. I take his hand. It's cool and dry. We walk out, R and I, with the children between us. Like a family.

As we exit the building and the fresh air hits our faces, I feel the barest flutter in the boy's birdlike wrist. Faint as butterfly wings—the first stirring of a pulse.


	5. Chapter 5

Our mornings are different now. Every morning, as soon as they are up, the children ricochet into our room, shrieking and laughing, and pulling at the blankets, urging us to wake up. The children are healed now, their skin soft and their eyes the same warm golden hue of R's and my own. I like that. It makes us feel even more like a real family. Sometimes when I'm out with the children and we run into someone we don't know, they say, "Oh, how beautiful! They have your eyes." And they do. They have the eyes of someone who has taken living death in a stranglehold and has choked it out. Eyes the color of hope.

We've been busy. Not just with the children. We've been working tirelessly to spread this virus of life wherever we can. And it's working. It's become safe enough to send parties out to other cities. We've seen our discovery spread to several different enclaves. Everywhere, death and stagnation are being thrown off. Now that the threat from the dead has abated, we are able to turn our attention beyond pure, simple survival. We can work on making life better, not just keeping life going. We've been collecting books and materials from empty libraries, schools, and universities. However, we're determined to do things differently this time. We remain scarred by our past, and we don't want to make the same mistakes.

R and I got married. He took my last name, since he doesn't have one. Marcus teased R mercilessly about being "chained up and domesticated," but I'd seen the way Marcus and Nora look at each other. I was hardly surprised when, a few weeks after R and I got married, they announced that Nora was pregnant and that they were going to be together too. I'm happy for them. Bringing a baby into the world doesn't seem like such a bleak and terrible thing anymore. Sometimes I look at R and imagine a boy with a shock of dark hair that stands on end like his, or a girl with the same long eyelashes. Who knows. The children are so excited about Marcus and Nora's baby. Sometimes, in this awaking universe, it feels like anything's possible.


End file.
